update.md

Updates

An update request allows us to update a document based on either a provided field set or a script. The operation loads the document, applies the script or merges the given fields, and re-indexes.

To update a document by id we use the updateById method.

client.execute {
  updateById("scifi", "4").doc(
    "name" -> "spock",
    "race" -> "vulcan"
  )
}

Which will update the document with id 4 with the new fields.

Update is bulk compatible so we can issue multiple requests at once

client.bulk {
  updateById("scifi", "5").doc("name" -> "spock"),
  updateById("scifi", "8").doc("name" -> "kirk"),
  updateById("scifi", "9").doc("name" -> "scottie")
}

If the document does not exist then an error will be returned. However, sometimes you might want to insert the document if it does not already exist, if so, you can use the upsert operation.

client.execute {
  updateById("scifi", "25").docAsUpsert(
    "character" -> "chewie",
    "race" -> "wookie"
  )
}

If document 25 does not exist then it will be created with the supplied fields.

Update also supports updating via a script, eg

client.execute {
  updateById("scifi", "5").script("ctx._source.birthplace = 'iowa'")
}

Now document 5 will had have its field birthplace set to iowa, which is of course Captain Kirk's birthplace.

If you want to do a script update with params then we need make a script instance and pass that to the update request.

client.sync.execute {
  updateById("scifi", "98").script(
    script("ctx._source.tags += tag").params(Map("tag"->"space"))
  }
}

Like index, you can use update with explicit field values.

client.execute {
  updateById("scifi", "14").docAsUpsert(
    NestedFieldValue("captain", Seq(SimpleFieldValue("james", "kirk")))
  )
}

Update by Query

We can perform an update by query as well as update by id.

The update-by-query query requires a script.

client.execute {
  updateByQuery("bands", term("type", "pop")).script(script("ctx._source.foo = 'a'").lang("painless"))
}

A common use case of update-by-query is to have a set of documents be refreshed to pick up changes in mappings by running the query without any changes.

client.execute {
  updateByQuery("pop", matchAllQuery())
}